


Urizen

by K_dAzrael



Series: Femme!Jokester [1]
Category: Batman (comicverse), DCU - Comicverse, DCU Earth 3
Genre: Drama, Genderswitch, Multi, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-06
Updated: 2010-01-06
Packaged: 2017-10-05 21:36:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/46269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_dAzrael/pseuds/K_dAzrael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before the Jokester fought crime she was the world's worst stand-up.</p><p>"The thing is Jackie, you're just not funny."</p><p>She rolls her slightly manic green eyes: "Yeah, I get told that <i>a lot</i>."</p><p>For those who don't know, Earth 3 is a DC Comics canon alternate universe where the moral opposites of the characters we know and love live. Owlman is that universe's Bruce Wayne - a feared crime lord who makes Patrick Bateman look tame. His arch nemesis is the Joke(ste)r, a former comedian turned vigilante who fights crime with gag-themed props and SHEER AWESOME.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Urizen

**Author's Note:**

> Yep, it's genderswitch - femme!Jokester, kicking asses and taking names.
> 
> What do you mean you don't know who the Jokester (i.e. good Joker) and Owlman (i.e. evil Batman) are? You, my friend, have clearly never heard of the wonderful phenomenon that is [Earth 3](http://overlithe.livejournal.com/39672.html). Go away and come back when you've boned up on your official DC alternate universes. The fic is largely a re-telling of 'The Jokester's Last laugh' from 'Countdown to Final Crisis: The Search for Ray Plamer (Crime Society)'.

_Lo! I unfold my darkness: and on  
This rock, place with strong hand the Book  
Of eternal brass, written in my solitude._

One command, one joy, one desire,  
One curse, one weight, one measure  
One King, one God, one Law.

*~*~*~*

**Part I: Women Aren't Funny**

"Jackie, I like ya kid. You got a lot of spunk gettin' up there, night after night, with all those meat-heads booing an' shouting 'take it off!'. Thing is... you're just not funny."

The woman with hair that looks like it was cut with kitchen scissors sighs, rests her chin on her hand and rolls her slightly manic green eyes. "Ye-ah, I get told that _a lot_."

The manager of the Last Laugh Comedy and Nite Club yanks his tie further askew and gulps his whiskey. "So, what? Why do you do it? It's like you got some kinda... weird compulsion."

Really, when you thought about it, she couldn't fit in less as a comedian – all the other guys are slick and self-consciously arrogant, favouring obscene material and delivering it with an unblinking casual malice. They make observations about fat chicks and vaginal douches. Her stumbling puns and surreal character studies have no place here (maybe they don't have a place anywhere). It's so bad he could almost believe that she wants to fail, that she enjoys humiliation. _Huh, maybe it's meant ta be postmodern or somethin'..._

"You wanna know _why_, Mikey?" she agitates the ice cubes in her drink with a straw and hooks a thumb beneath one of her purple braces. "I gotta warn you, it's a long and cheesy story... if you don't wanna hear it, now's the time to fake a seizure."

Mikey gives her a roguish wink. "Go on – lay it on me, kid."

"Y'know, if I wanted to make some real money I guess I'd write one of those 'my shitty childhood' memoirs that people seem to lap up. Oh yeah, I have all the ingredients: runaway mom, drunk dad, crappy inner city school where the boys tortured me physically and the girls tortured me psychologically – _sob_ – _snore_..." she rolls her eyes again and lets her tongue poke out of the corner of her mouth.

"Point is, I've always been the universe's punching bag... but it all changed the day I met _him_..." immediately her eyes soften and her lips turn up at the edges. "Y'know how, when a little kid dies they always say 'oh, he was too good for this world'? I always thought that was just a bullshit thing people say to make themselves feel better, but Evelyn Dent really _was_ like that. You always half-expected to turn around and see him floating up to heaven on a sunbeam...

"That was his name, by the way – Evelyn – a quaint, old fashioned name like you never hear for a boy. And it suited him, too – 'cause he was what you'd call 'otherworldly'... blond hair to his shoulders and the biggest baby-blues – he looked like he carried around his own lighting effects. All the girls at school thought he was just _dreamy_..." she clasps her hands together and holds them to her chest in imitation of an infatuated teenager, "but y'know what? – it was _me_ he liked. I never could figure that out... I guess sometimes the universe just decides to toss you a bone, y'know – maybe to stop you killing yourself so it can torture you some more later. Ha!

"So, one day I'm horsing around by the fountain, I catch sight of this angel-who-walks-among-us and I prat-fall right in. Sploosh! Great, I think. Real smooth, Jackie, you just had to wear a white t-shirt today... I surface, coughing and hacking all over the place and there's the angel, smiling, offering me his hand... and his jacket. And walking me home... and asking for my number. These things don't happen, I keep thinking. Not to girls like me, anyhow..." she props her elbow up on the table and rests her chin on the palm of her hand, her eyes falling almost closed as she loses herself in the nostalgic recollection.

"And after that it's one of those cheesy teen movie montages. Homework parties, sharing malts at the drugstore... shy kisses on the doorstep and bits where he says 'gee, I don't know if we're ready' and I say 'don't be a pussy, Evelyn, get your pants off...'"

"So what happened?" Mikey prompts when she stares off into space for a little too long.

She looks surprised, as if he should know the answer to that. "What always happens in a teen movie – I got knocked up. 'Course... fate being what it is, I didn't find that out until it was too late to do anything about it. Evelyn wanted to keep it – he was an optimist, you know... thought everyone was as good as he was. He'd look at me and say 'Jackie, we'll find a way'. But we were sixteen, neither of us had a job and it wasn't like our _loooving families_ were going to help us... so, I did what had to be done. I signed the papers.

"It was a girl. I didn't get to hold her or anything... the adoption agency people took her and I... got over it – became the well-adjusted person I am today – HA!" her smile quivers for a moment and her gaze becomes far-away again. "But Evelyn... he just couldn't. He wasn't like me, not made of the same stuff at all... I'm like one of those little stress-ball guys y'know?" she makes her fingers into claws and contracts them. "Squeeze me all out of shape and I spring back. But Evelyn... he was brittle, you might say, and so he just broke – and I... I sure as hell didn't know how to put him back together.

"Maybe he just didn't know how bad the world really is, maybe he was disappointed in me, I don't know. Then one day, he up and left and I was back to square one – little older, no wiser and plus a whole lot of goddamn stretch marks. Heh, aint that a kick in the teeth?"

She looks up heavenwards, as if she expects that is where Evelyn has gone. "He always used to say I was funny. He meant it too – he'd laugh and those blue eyes would twinkle and he'd say 'Jackie, you're hilarious – you should be on the stage'. So... here I am... because he said so. And even if I suck, I'm going to keep doing it... y'know, 'til somebody does the world a favour and drops a sandbag on my head..." the story drifts into a silence more awkward than that which follows one of her terrible punchlines.

Mikey finds his voice tight with emotion as he endeavours to say something to break the melancholic spell: "y'know... maybe you could be funny."

"Yeah?" her eyes become wide and earnest. "You really think so?"

"Sure kid," he shoots her a smile. "You know what you need? A shtick, a gimmick."

"You mean... like some kind of sexy costume-outfit-_thing_?" she gestures to her own meagre bosom. "Because I'm not sure I have the, uh, _presence_ for that."

"No, no, I mean like–" but Mikey never finishes the sentence because the plate window smashes and a shower of glass rains down on them both.

And suddenly there he is – the goddamn Owlman.

"Remember how I said you'd get two warnings about missing those protection payments, Mikey?" the mouth beneath the mask twists in an expression of pure sadistic pleasure. "I lied."

"_AAaaargh_!"

Jackie just watches, and he hasn't even noticed her because she's so still and quiet.

And she's smiling, for the first time in what seems like years... a grin that tugs and strains at the corners of her mouth.

Because she has an idea.

*~*~*

She pauses at the stage door to sign autographs, but when she lingers too long her power-suited manager elbows her way through the crowd, grasps Jackie's skinny wrist and drags her off in the direction of the waiting limo.

"Watch the threads, Harley-girl," she protests weakly, feeling the tugging against the underarm seam of her green and yellow candy-stripe suit. When Harley relinquishes her grip, Jackie reaches up to run a finger around the inside of the collar of her purple turtleneck sweater – she's working on looking more presentable these days, now that she's a _celebrity_. Her hair has grown long and sleek and she wears it tied loosely at the nape of her neck with a lavender coloured ribbon.

"... And they're very funny jokes..." Harley is saying.

"You're a really spiffy manager Harl," Jackie tells her, watching the blonde ponytail swing and bounce with each sure step.

Harley pauses and half turns as she reaches for the door handle of the limo, holding a bundle of programmes against her chest like a schoolgirl clutches her notebook. "I thought maybe... I could be more than that."

"More than _spiffy_?" Jackie summons up a facetious grin – she hopes maybe that will kill the moment so that she won't have to give a real answer, but she sees the uncertainty in Harley's wide blue eyes – _blue eyes, like..._

Jackie thinks for a terrible moment that she'll have to explain (and God, how will there ever be words to explain?). _Gee Harley you're swell and all, but I think you're barking up the wrong tree – oh, it's not that I don't like girls, it's just that I'm dead inside. Yep, still pining for some guy I lost a decade ago and some kid I never knew anyway. Thanks though, I'm flattered, try me again in another ten years..._

She lays her hand on her the other woman's shoulder – because hell, she's gotta be serious for a moment here – but then the door of the limo opens and Harley is jerked out of sight with a cut-off scream. It seems only a split-second – something too fast to be caught by the human eye or processed by the brain – and a mass of red fabric and blonde hair is barreling into Jackie's arms.

Jackie opens her mouth to say "Harley, what happened?" but she only gets as far as "Ha–" before she sees the way the fabric is all torn and something... blood – blood and other matter... is spilling out. Oh God, those are Harley's insides, hot and slithery against her hands, giving off wisps of steam in the night air. She jerks back in helpless revulsion, hesitating before reaching out towards Harley's face, dribbling blood all over the lenses of her glasses.

_This isn't really happening – it's a trick, a practical joke – this isn't Harley, must be a dummy – a dummy stuffed with meat_ – Jackie moans softly; a kind of lowing, animal noise she has never heard herself make before. A shadow falls over her and the turns her head and sees _him_.

He's huge, towering above her at a vertiginous angle and her mind is all the high whine of microphone feedback. She can't move, can't speak – she is frozen like a figure from an amateur dramatics tableaux. She manages a hoarse scream when he reaches down to grab her, but the sound is choked into silence when the fabric of her jacket constricts around her throat.

The rush of air, the breaking of glass and thud of impact that makes everything go soundless for a moment. The pain in her skull is so intense that she keeps expecting to black out, but for some reason her traitorous body decides to keep her in the here and now. She sprawls on her back on the ground when he drops her and she becomes intensely aware of the feeling of sharp gravel beneath her grazed palms and the breath of wind ruffling her hair. It is as if the past ten years have been a dream that she has numbly drifted through and she has been suddenly startled awake, pitched into a world where everything is too loud and sensation is magnified. Her heart thuds against her ribcage.

"Tell me something you unfunny bitch, you sad, pathetic little jokester..." she remembers that voice, the low growl underlaid by a rich tone of pleasure, "who's laughing now?"

It is a clear, cloudless night; the full moon looms menacingly over Gotham and he is strikingly outlined by its frigid white-blue light. He must have picked this evening specially; she wonders how long he's been watching and waiting for the perfect moment to strike. There is something silver in his hand. _A mezzaluna? No – Jesus, it's shaped like an owl_.

When he picks her up again she sees herself reflected in his goggles: her face elongated and white, deep wells of shadow beneath her cheekbones. Her mouth hangs open and only when she sees her lips contorting does she realise that she's whimpering. She narrows her eyes to focus on him, recognizing the ridiculous costume she's made fun of so many times and the bare portion of his face: thin lips set in a hard line, the strong jaw. It suddenly hits her – _I asked for this_. This was what she had wanted, deep down, what she had invited all along – swift and certain death.

_God, I'm so sorry Harley... you were one of the good ones, I never meant for you–_

She closes her eyes and tilts her head back, going slack in his arms – a moment of surrender, like some film noir dame who's all zingers and affronted slaps until crushed to a manly bosom.

"Look at me," she hears him say, but his voice is faint, so far away. _Bad connection, hang-up and try again._

"LOOK AT ME!" _Boy, even from a distance, he sounds pissed._

His blade is in her mouth now, cold and inescapable; the flat of it presses down her tongue and the edge bites the seam between each lip.

"Open your eyes."

But she doesn't – this isn't about what he wants.

*~*~*

She awakens to morphine nausea and the sound of a news report on low, gently lapping against her consciousness like waves on a shore.

She catches a familiar name.

She struggles to sit up and blinks until she can see the picture. An unflattering paparazzi snap of Harley looking over one shoulder.

Harley's dead, she realises, which is all wrong – Harley should be alive, _she's_ the one that's meant to be dead.

She hears her own name; learns that she's in a 'critical condition'. She tries to come up with a line about everyone being a critic but she can't seem to make the pun slip into place. She raises her hands to her head and finds it swathed in bandages.

_What did he do to me?_

Shaking hands unwind the rolls of gauze; by touch she makes the discovery that her face is now largely held together with sutures. She traces the wound's shape with her fingertips as if following a dot-to-dot: _a big ol' smile – huh, guess the massive psycho actually does have a sense of humour... of sorts. You might call it a 'performance piece'._

Well, don't you ruffle a feather, Tweety-Pie, I won't let them spoil your finest work. She hooks a fingernail beneath a stitch at the very corner of her mouth and sharply pulls.

As she works at further unraveling herself, she laughs.

Because she has another idea – a better one.

_It wasn't right before... it was tame, half-hearted. I wasn't looking at the big picture. Now I understand – it's not just a schtick, not just a one-liner..._

Now I know what I have to become to stop someone like you...

*~*~*

"When will you learn? You. Are. Not. Funny."

"You know, it's all subjective – funny is in the rib of the tickled, the knee of the slapper..."

"Shut up."

"Aren't you going to make a joke about me being a slapper? Come on Owlsie – I set you up for that one!"

"I'm going to END YOU clown."

The punch he plants in her gut is like being plowed into by a chevy. Her eyes stream and she wheezes, then she opens her mouth and laughs in his face, blood and spittle bubbling up on her cracked, painted lips. "Oh big boy, you're losing your touch!"

_That's it, make him angry. He gets sloppy when he's angry._

She sidesteps and confuses his vision with a twirl of her green overcoat. "What happened to us? The earth used to move..." a punch to her shoulder which throbs and then goes pleasantly numb. She has enough time to crinkle her brows at him before she has to duck the next one. "Is there someone else, my turtle dove? You can tell me. Don't worry – I'm not, uh, a _bunny boiler_. Stalking was always _your_ forte..."

She reaches for the button on her belt and the miniature boxing glove (titanium covered in red leather) makes a comical _sproooing_ sound as it launches to smack unerringly into the underside of Owlman's jaw, snapping his head back and making him stumble onto his back foot. _Heh, good ol' Owlsie – he never learns_. She ducks beneath his outstretched arm and dives for the extendable mallet he just moments ago knocked from her hands.

She's tiring, which is dangerous – her only advantages in a one-on-one fight situation are that she is quicker than he is, and that her moves are less predictable, so she knows she ought to stick to the old 'pull a fast one and retreat' gambit. This fight has gone on much too long and she is rapidly losing her edge, her leg and arm muscles are screaming with lactic acid.

She hits the ground and her fingers almost close around the weapon's handle, but even through the leather of her long boots she can feel the grip of a hand clamped around her ankle, and suddenly she is yanked backwards.

"Miss me already?" she purrs as she rolls out of the way of his fist and causes him to punch the pavement instead, letting out a howl of pain and fury. Discovering a hidden reserve of energy, she body-flips back onto her feet and cracks her neck, grinning in enticement as the blood drips on to the layered ruffles of her purple blouse.

(And nothing, nothing, has ever been as good as this – the thrust and parry, where hesitation or one false move means death. She was never much of a one for dancing – too clumsy and couldn't seem to make her steps agree with her partner's – but when she fights the Owlman it feels like they are in an instinctive rhythm.)

"Aww, poor little owlet," she croons, "did you hurt your handy? Want mommy to kiss it better?" (the mother cracks always really _get_ him, for some reason, even more than the bird puns and the faux-sweet nothings).

"You'll kiss it, alright," he snarls and lunges for her again, and even though his aim has been rendered inaccurate by his rage, the glancing blow to her ribs is enough to slam her back against the wall. Her legs buckle beneath her and she hits the ground hard, landing heavily on her tailbone.

_Damage report, body? 'Catastrophic butt failure'. Don't give me that, get up! 'Response not found'. Ok, ok... let's go for a line instead_. She spits and wipes at the corner of her mouth, feigning surprise at the red smear she finds on her fingers. "Bleeding again? I guess it must be my 'time of the month'..."

A flicker of disgust passes over Owlman's face and he flexes his hand, the leather of the gauntlet creaking. "That was your last joke, clown."

Suddenly a voice rings out, echoing off the flat roofs, a precise clipped tone: "which animal can see most clearly in total darkness: a bat, a tiger, or an _owl_?"

Owlman's head whips around so fast he almost manages the one hundred and eighty degree turn his totem animal is famous for. Standing atop of a chimney stack on a level above theirs is a man in a green skintight suit that sparkles in the dirty lamplight. He leans jauntily on a question mark-shaped crook.

"This owl can see well enough to hit you from here, freak, if that answers your question."

But as Owlman plants his feet further apart and reaches down for a throwing blade there is a rush of air behind them and the Feathered Fiend's upper body disappears beneath a layer of spangled black cloth and a slightly higher voice sings out: "wrong answer bird-brain. Nothing can see in _total_ darkness."

The Jokester's eyes widen. _Heh, nice timing!_

A third figure appears on the scene, a multi-coloured blur that blackflips to land a lovely kick against the struggling villain's chest before cartwheeling off back out of sight.

Then things happen too fast for the Jokester to see and firework flashes hurt her eyes. She sees blood on Owlsie's teeth as he turns and fires his grappling hook. "Some other time, clown. Not in the mood for this gang-up crap."

The man in the green spangled number hooks his cane over a cable and slides down to her level. As she climbs to her feet, the Jokester puts her palms to the small of her back and curves her spine inwards until it makes a series of grotesque pops and cracks. "So, to what do I owe this pleasure, mister... uh... (help me out here)..."

He tips his bowler hat over one eye and holds out his green-gloved hand. "I'm the Riddler."

"Oh yeah, heard of you... and your, er, lady-companions?"

"I'm not exactly a 'lady'," answers the voice from before; its owner then takes a step forward into the circle of light cast by the adjacent street lamp to show the white semi-circle that comprises half her face. She has short, pale hair that stands up in jagged tufts and her long eyelashes cast thin bars of shadow onto a pale cheek. Her lips are made fuller by pink gloss and a pencil line drawn around their edges.

A second step brings the figure into full view, revealing the face to be asymmetrical. A sleek blonde fringe covers the left eye, and on the same side, waved hair falls to lie against the neck. The other half of the mouth is unembellished and consequently the lips appear thinner.

"Wow," remarks the Jokester, "A-plus for dramatic use of lighting."

A tapered eyebrow raises and the black-spangled opera cloak is thrown back to reveal the costume beneath – which is similarly bifurcated, but joined together down the middle with large 'x' shaped stitches. The right, 'female' side of the outfit is a tiger-print leotard and half a pair of black tights, the left 'male' side a white vest with horizontal orange stripes and half a pair of high-rise black silk shorts. The shoes, at least, match: a full pair of white lace-up high-tops, such as an old-timey carnival strongman would wear.

"Allow me to introduce Two-Face," says the Riddler in a rich, affectionate tone.

The Jokester is about to make a disingenuous crack along the lines of "so, uh, why do they call you that?" when the gymnast hops and flips back into view. When this third figure finally stands still long enough, the Jokester can see that it's a teenage girl and that the costume she wears is a lovely patchwork of diamond-patterns of antique silk in pale green, pink and white, topped off by a harlequin ruff. The girl is the artificial pale of the chalky water-based variety of stage make-up that the Jokester herself uses, and her chestnut hair is cut boyishly short and worn in a side-parting. Something about her looks vaguely familiar.

"He's gone," she announces, "lost sight of him at fifth and Nero."

"Gee, too bad Tweets had to beat it," the Jokester says with false regret, shading her eyes with her hand and gazing off in the direction in which her nemesis beat his hasty retreat. "Guess he must be late for his closeted villains support group... or is it Irish dancing that he has on a Thursday?"

The laugh, soft and so hauntingly familiar makes her turn her head.

"Evelyn?!" she advances on the figure known as Two-Face and brushes back the obscuring curtain of blond hair to search for the features of her lost lover, but instead of the unblemished skin she expects she finds raised scarring, a forked pattern that runs across one cheek like a fault line, and a sightless milky eye. She grips a bare left arm and murmurs: "oh God, Evelyn, what hap–"

"Back off, bitch, he doesn't want to talk to you!" a snub-nosed pistol is cocked and jabbed into the Jokester's shoulder, but she doesn't move away until the Riddler comes and drags her backwards with firm insistence.

She watches dumbly as the Riddler folds Two-Face against himself so that the female side remains outermost. He dips his head and plants a reassuring kiss on the scarred portion of face.

"What Two-Face is trying to clue you in on is that the man you loved sixteen years ago comprises only half of the individual you see before you now – and he doesn't say much since the accident. It's Eve who takes care of things."

"'Eve'?"

"Not the brightest spark, is she?" Two-Face comments, clicking the safety back on and plugging the gun back into a holster belt. "No wonder she went and got herself knocked up."

"Knocked up?" the teenager repeats, her green eyes lighting up with urgency. "Is she... are you called Jackie?"

"Once upon a time kiddo, though nowadays they call me the– oof!" she almost falls over backwards when the girl launches herself at her and hugs her in a way that doesn't entirely agree with her bruised ribs.

"Mom!"

"Oh yeah," says (Eve)lyn offhandedly, "by the way, I raised your kid for you... no need to thank me. Her name's Duela."

**Author's Note:**

> The title is a reference to a character from William Blake's prophetic poetry. Urizen (a pun on 'your reason') is a jealous creator-god who likes to make rules and own everything. His rival is an explosion of rebellious energy called Orc, an entity who is kind of a cross between Jesus and Satan, if you can imagine that.
> 
> Two-Face's costume is based on that of [Josephine Joseph](http://www.silverscreenings.net/screens/freaks/images/pdvd_005.jpg), a famous carnival performer from the early twentieth century (who appears as his/herself in Todd Browning's cult 1932 film Freaks). (S)he claimed to be a genuine hermaphrodite, but was probably a female-to-male impersonator. As you can see from the pic of J-J, my Two-Face has actually reversed the gender significations - her right 'strongman' half is her female side, while her vulnerable silk-clad side is her male one. (Oh gee, there's my feminist agenda... I wondered where I'd left it!)
> 
> Oh, and the whole Eve/Evelyn thing is unashamedly stolen from Angela Carter's The Passion of New Eve.
> 
> Btw, 'slapper' is Brit slang for a slut (especially an older, sloppily-dressed one). I know it's probably not the American lexicon of our Gothamite friends, but I just couldn't resist the pun.


End file.
